Company founder inducted into advertising Hall of Fame

Dan Yessian, award-winning musician, composer and founder of the music, sound design and soundscapes production company Yessian, headquartered in Farmington Hills, will be inducted Wednesday, July 25, into the Adcraft Hall of Fame at The Madison Building in Detroit.

Yessian will be recognized for his career, spanning almost 50 years, and his contributions to the advertising industry locally and across the globe.

“Dan is an amazing ambassador for the advertising community in Detroit,” said Michelle Rossow, executive director of Adcraft, the oldest advertising association in the United States. “He is like our city – hardworking, humble and creative at his core. In addition to building a company with an impressive local client roster, Yessian also gives the Detroit advertising industry a global footprint.”

Founded in 1971 in a renovated bait shop in Farmington Hills, the company’s clients include some of the world’s best-known brands in advertising, film, television, gaming and theme parks, such as Ford, RAM, Toyota, Disney, Budweiser, Macy’s, United Airlines, Walmart, Coca-Cola, IKEA, Mont Blanc, L’Oreal, McDonald’s, Volvo and Porsche.

Yessian himself composed numerous iconic local and national advertising campaign jingles, including “Dittrich Furs by the Dittrich Family,” “Dodge Boys Have More Fun,” and Whirlpool’s “We’re making your life a little easier.” The company has won many national and international awards for its musical arrangements for commercials.

“I am truly honored to be recognized by my talented peers in the advertising world,” Yessian said. “I have had the privilege of collaborating with some of the most gifted musicians and producers in the country while growing my company. It stills remains a joy for me to sit down at the piano and create music.”

Yessian and his two sons, Brian and Michael, who became his partners in the mid-1990s, have grown the company into a worldwide collective of producers, composers, music supervisors and research creatives and recording artists.

Yessian the company, with satellite offices in New York, Los Angeles and Hamburg, Germany, also has a music licensing and research division of indie bands and well-known artists called Dragon Licks.

Some of the company’s other well-known projects include creating music for NBC television network shows, including “The Voice,” “Rise,” “America’s Got Talent” and “Sunday Night Football.” The Yessian company also created the music and sound design experience for the One World Trade Center and its Observatory in New York City.

In 2016, Yessian wrote a classical composition, "An Armenian Trilogy," which pays homage to his Armenian heritage by commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Armenian genocide. The fully orchestrated version was performed for the first time in Armenia’s capital city, Yerevan, by the Armenian Philharmonic Orchestra in 2017.